


In the Secret of this Room

by thefrenchmistake



Category: Criminal Minds (US TV)
Genre: Adultery, Episode: s14e15 Truth or Dare, F/M, Post-Season/Series 14, Weddings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:22:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,492
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22200232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thefrenchmistake/pseuds/thefrenchmistake
Summary: She supposes some things cannot lie. She supposes there are things you can’t hide, like the dilatation of pupils or the tainting of her skin or slight hitch in her breath. Things that cannot be controlled or altered even with her capacity to bluff and lie (almost never to him).
Relationships: Jennifer "JJ" Jareau/Spencer Reid
Comments: 5
Kudos: 134





	In the Secret of this Room

**Author's Note:**

> Hi everyone ! So, first post on this website featuring JJ and Spencer; after the season 14 finale, I couldn't get this idea out of my head and after the rollercoaster that were the season 15 episodes, I just had to post it. To be honest, I ship both Willifer and Jeid, so be warned: this is not a happy ending for Jeid. 
> 
> On this, hope you enjoy !

Her head hurts.   
Maybe she drank too much. Maybe the music is getting to her head. Maybe the crowd and the warmth are making her dizzy, provoking the pounding in her temples and ears (or maybe it’s the confession still ringing in the air, the confession she never intended to say out loud and cannot take back).   
She doesn’t allow her mind to go there, although it is burning her brains and eyes when they accidentally land on Spence. The smile plastered on his lips is fake, too absent, too distracted, she can see it from where she sits. 

God.   
What did she do ?   
Jennifer is a good agent. A damn good one at that. She knows what makes un-subs tick, what sets them off. She knows how to buy time and negotiate, she knows how to calm them down or provoke. She reads their actions and expressions and can sometimes see their thoughts.   
She knows people.   
That’s how she managed to keep this confession hidden; she would have never said it out loud, but there are more ways to reveal something than talking.   
Spence knows that; Spence is the best profiler, thus the best at reading micro-expressions, thus the biggest threat to her secret.   
Well, all this worry, all this work she put in this hiding, all of it can be thrown out now.  
All these times she smiled too wide at him, let her eyes linger, held him too close and hugged him too long, all these times she worried she would give it away, they’re for nothing now. She never intended for him to know. Never.   
She had let herself dream more than once, of course, but…  
But there was Will, and their work, and so much more that she can’t even wrap her head around it. 

God, her headache is getting worse.  
Will made her dance twice, until she smiled and told him her feet hurt and she went to sit down.   
She hasn’t moved since then.   
Her thoughts are a fucking hurricane, and she isn’t used to that, she isn’t used to her lifestyle being endangered from the inside, by something she has no control over.   
Will is making Garcia twirl with a laugh, and she can’t, she can’t.   
She surges to her feet and makes sure no one is watching her as she flees to the cloakroom, far less obvious than the bathroom if Will decides to look for her. Thank God, the room is actually quite big, the right half meant for coats and purses, leaving the left part almost empty except for a medium-sized cabinet with a mirror.   
She carefully closes the door before she allows herself to feel the tremble in her hands, the weakness of her legs, the tears in her eyes.  
She huffs. One would think she controls herself better. One would think she can compartmentalize until they are all out of this wedding, until there is no risk anymore (to cry, to lash out, to let the words stumble out of her lips). She leans her elbows on the cabinet, lowers her head between her hands to create a dark, quiet space where her mind might stop twirling and screaming at her. 

She breathes.   
How did it go down so wrong so fast ? She panicked. She panicked. He held a gun to her head and asked her to say something and she could’ve lied, she is good at that, she could’ve… But Spence was in danger. Spence might take a bullet in the head, or she could, and her sons were in the back of her mind all this time and she couldn’t risk it.   
So she jeopardized the most beautiful friendship she had, maybe the most important relationship of her life.  
And Spence, Spence told her it was ok.   
Jennifer grits her teeth, pressing her eyes shut tighter, until patches of color appear.   
He thought he managed his expressions so well; but his voice shook, his entire body sagged, his eyes teared up.   
Why ? She isn’t sure, still. She tried to keep herself from thinking about it since he told her this, but… 

She breathes.   
The light is low, the room is dimmed, and blissfully empty and quiet. She breathes.   
The door behind her closes. She tenses. She doesn’t turn around, afraid of what she might see and do if she does. 

“Did you mean it ?”

Yes, of course, yes, _how could she not ?_

“You already asked me that.”

“And you didn’t answer.”

“I thought it was ok,” she manages to say through her closed up throat, tears welling up in her eyes. She doesn’t want to say it.

She can’t say it. If she says it, she is a bad mother, a bad wife, a bad person. She cannot physically draw the words out. 

“It is. It’s just…” He is silent for too long, so she inhales deeply and turns around, blinking. 

He is so beautiful. His hands are in his pockets, like he is keeping them there to avoid touching her (she knows this intimately), his eyes are intent on her, striking. She has almost never seen him in a tuxedo and she tries to put away the part of her (very large, very very large) that wants to kiss him. 

She is not a bad person. So she won’t budge. She won’t move. 

He does though. He takes a step forward and she should get out, shouldn’t she ? She should push past him and get out, there is too much risk in here. 

“It’s just that…” he repeats, interrupting himself once more.

He steps forward until he is right in front of her and she knows what’s going to happen, she knows but she can’t believe it. His hands come to cradle her cheeks and his look is studying, roaming over her face. His concentration takes her breath away. 

“I wasn’t sure before,” he whispers, and his breath hits her lips, her eyes flutter. “But now…”

She supposes some things cannot lie. She supposes there are things you can’t hide, like the dilatation of pupils or the tainting of her skin or slight hitch in her breath. Things that cannot be controlled or altered even with her capacity to bluff and lie (almost never to him). 

And then that’s it. Spencer kisses her. 

Jennifer has thought a lot about this -she should save appearance and say it was juts once or twice, but it wouldn’t be true; she had fifteen years. Of course she thought about it.   
He is much more fervent and demanding in real life. She makes a sound when his mouth touches hers, high in her throat and the last part of her brain that functions correctly tells her to push him back, but she could never.   
Her hands come up as well, locking around his neck, pushing him closer as his lips move on her and take everything, everything. He tilts her head with a hand on her jaw to place her how he wants, and she’d lie if she said it doesn’t do something to her. 

It’s rushed, it’s fire, it’s adrenaline, and she can’t think, she can just follow his lead and whimper when he surges forward still, cages her between the cabinet behind her and his body -too hot, too hot, it’s making her head spin. His thumb is caressing her jaw, and she can’t think, she can’t breath as their tongues -for the first time, God it already seems so familiar, because she knows him so well- meet. The imminent danger is staring at her and she has enough will to break the kiss (only inches, she doesn’t want to, she doesn’t want to) and try to find her words. 

“We can’t,” she chokes out.

He noses at her cheek, then lower, until his mouth finds her pulse point and she gasps.

“I know. I still want to,” he says simply, like it doesn’t shatter her walls and rip her heart out.

She feels him hold back, lips brushing her skin, waiting for her rejection, but her fingers have found his neck and pass in his hair without pushing him away; on the contrary, they pull him closer without her mind’s approbation. His tongue darts out to taste her perfume and her fingers become claws in his hair, tugging him up until they’re kissing again, all desperation and fury and broken hearts. 

  
Her husband… her husband is right outside, she should… she really should… 

He pulls back, biting her lower lip before letting it go, earning a little moan from her. 

“Don’t think about it,” he whispers against her cheek, because of course he can feel her mind wander off.

She is going to answer -she is going to say stop, we shouldn’t do this, I need to go back, this is _wrong_ \- but then he drops to his knees before her and looks up. The sight is breathtaking. His hands grip her legs just above her knees, burning, and she gasps. 

She knows he’s waiting for her to stop him-she’s waiting for herself to stop him-but nothing comes out of her mouth; her hands come to lean on the cabinet though, her back arching. Something passes in his eyes, surprise or victory or lust, she couldn’t say, but she gets a pretty good idea when his fingers trail along her thighs, to the hem of her short red dress and under, his lips barely brushing the skin of her knee. She is the one to tug the dress up while he hooks his fingers in the lace of her panties and tugs them down, eyes on her face and lips on her skin. 

He looks at her like he’s trying to memorize how she looks, how she sounds, how she reacts. She knows he is, because so is she. This would be a one-time thing. A stumble in her marriage, a glitch in their friendship, nothing more (they couldn’t allow themselves the luxury of thinking about what ifs and hopes and unattainable dreams in parallel universes). So she categorizes each piece of this moment she can hide next to her heart and hold jealously, preciously. His face (mesmerizing, open like she has never seen before), his touch (burning, burning, she always thought him too warm for this freezing world), his posture (assured and confident even on his knees), and the gleam in his eye carves itself on the inside of her retina, just as his fingerprints carve themselves into her skin.

She commits it all to memory.

The instant stretches in time, both of them too scared to allow their minds to wander towards after (after, when she’ll pull her dress back down and he’ll redo his shirt; after, when he’ll open the door and close it forever on this stolen bliss; after, when he’ll be the best godfather there ever was an she’ll be the best wife and mother she can be; after, when she’ll go back to her husband and love him with all she has because she is a good person and good persons don’t love two people and don’t feel torn apart), and it’s peacefully quiet in the room. Then he bows his head; she grips his hair, exhales shakily, and they both lose themselves. 

***********************

The aftermath is heartbroken, and feels like the end of a world. 

They don’t break apart as soon as they regain their breath, no. They remain where they are for a moment, just a moment more, just a moment to be before everything shatters. 

She noses at his cheek, tears welling up in her eyes. He inhales her scent (once more, just once more), shuts the voice in his head that whispers _you could have this, you could have this_ and pulls back a little. 

They look at each other for a while just looking, just existing, and their irises scream everything they won’t say (I never meant to hurt you, I should’ve done this years ago, I’ve always loved you) even as their bodies still tremble. She pulls him close to hug him (one last time, just one), her arms locked around his shoulders while he wraps his around her body, big hands splaying on her back to feel her so close (one last time, just one).

Then, they have to move.

They have to come back to the real world, displaying just outside the door. So he lets her go, and she pushes him back. She buttons up his shirt once he puts it on, efficient and delicate. She pulls her dress down after slipping on her undergarments. When all is done and they both look relatively normal (she tied her hair and his always looked like a mess so that wouldn’t make a difference), they take a breath, gather the courage to do what they both know has to be done and Spencer turns around, walks to the door. 

He’s standing there, unmoving, his back to her. 

They don’t feel guilty, not really; they know they shouldn’t have, they know it’s wrong, but it didn’t feel wrong and fifteen years is a lifetime and…

“I love you,” she whispers, and it’s broken and so, so sad he could cry.

He knows she means it this time, he knows it without an ounce of doubt. He stops himself from turning around and looking at her one last time (her scent lingers on his skin, and he swears he feels the ghost of her touch where she caressed his back and neck), because he knows he’ll want to stay in there with JJ forever, and eventually the real world will come crashing down on them.

“I love you,” he breathes, his forehead against the wooden door and his eyes pressed shut, and it’s a goodbye, they both know it. It is the first -and last time- he says it, and the words taste bitter on his tongue.

Once they exit this room, they will never acknowledge what happened. They will never talk about it, they will certainly never do it again. They’ll stay friends, of course they will, best friends; but they won’t be anything more again.

And if JJ lets her eyes linger on his back when he walks away, remembering the nail marks she left there, if Spence cannot sleep at night because he still feels her breath on his skin and hears her whimpers in his neck, well they’ll ignore it.

If JJ threads her fingers through Will’s hair and lets herself imagine she’s tugging at soft curls, she will indulge in her memory when she cannot resist, and put it on the throes of passion. If Spencer fucks a blonde girl and his thoughts wander to the way their hips don’t aline perfectly like with JJ, the way she doesn’t sound quite right, he’ll bury his face in the stranger’s neck and mouth another name against her skin, letting it disappear into thin air, into silence. 

And it’s ok. 

It has to be. 

**Author's Note:**

> And that's a roll ! 
> 
> Hope you enjoyed, kudos and feedback (positive or negative) are always welcome,  
> See you soon !


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